contact . However , all bottled water was eliminated by Mount Auburn and replaced with tap water in 2014 .
Administrative and building maintenance staff helped make the transition from bottled water to filtered tap water as the main source of drinking water . In 2014 , Mount Auburn saved approximately $ 7,000 by not using big bottles of water with coolers and plastic cups . Saving money isn ’ t the only thing good about drinking tap water . It saves other precious resources such as electricity used by the machinery to pump and fill the big bottles , and gas and diesel fuel required for transporting those bottles to customers . The installed filters reduce sediment ( though not typical in municipally supplied water ) and remove the chlorine taste and odor . Even without the filters however , the water is perfectly safe to drink , but now it tastes better . And raise a glass of water to everyone who works on the grounds and is willing to bring in their own reusable bottle instead of using plastic cups !
Paper Use and Recycling : Inside the offices by the mid-2000s , a concerted effort for all Paper Recycling was implemented . A switch from single stream recycling to all recyclables being mixed together allowed for one recycling bin rather than two to be located at convenient locations . Mount Auburn ’ s Green Team , now Sustainability Working Groups , has been responsible for keeping track of the waste and recycling pickups . According to our recycling vendor ,
Save that Stuff , Mount Auburn ’ s recycling program processed about 6 tons of paper , plastic , glass and metals each year for two years ; thereby saving per year about 35 trees , 19 cubic yards of landfill waste , and about 1800 kWh of electricity . A field trip to the recycling facility allowed one to gain new respect for those people and facilities that sift and separate thousands of pieces of plastics from paper so it can be baled and shipped to a manufacturer ready to use it as recycled source material for a new finished product . “ Buy 100 % recycled products ” is the takeaway message .
In an effort to reduce paper use , a competition between offices was held in 2012 to determine which one could most significantly reduce their paper use compared with 2011 purchases . Much to everyone ’ s amazement , the building that houses the Finance & Administration departments won . How did they do it ?
Reasons They Won the Challenge � Printing double-sided pages � Using white boards for ‘ thinking ’ rather than paper � Not printing emails that require action . Instead we moved the emails into “@ Action ” or
“@ Follow-up ” folders � Selecting only sections or relevant pages of emails ( particularly if it only prints the disclaimer on a separate page ) � Waiting to print any Trustee or Committee package closer to the mailing deadlines because of last minute changes from the President � Viewing spreadsheets on two monitors instead of printing worksheets when verifying numbers � Instead of printing and then scanning we print right to a PDF ( Adobe )
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